Reports that Amdahl Corp is having difficulties with its four-way processors appear to be true, with those systems shipped before the end of September most affected (CI No 2,062): over 80 systems will have to be replaced; the six- and eight-way processors use newer technology, version 2.1, which ironed out some of the initial problems; Amdahl planned to move users to 2.1 anyway, but the company has been forced to speed up the transition; one problem has been a too rapid abandonment of ozone-damaging chloro-fluoro-carbons used to clean the boards; Amdahl now uses a mixture of distilled water and alcohol, but it appears to be less effective and some systems are failing every 2,000 hours, against a claimed 25,000 hours for the A series.
